Are you new to Jhene Aiko? It's not like she just appeared like the RKO (…"out of nowhere!!"? No? Sorry.) She's been with TDE since 2011 if not earlier and she definitely had some solo tracks before this batch.

1. The Doppelgangaz - Hark

What I currently need is a Gameological (it's still real to me dammit) take on Stick it to The Man, which looks like something I might love or hate. I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen though, so if anyone has read a smart review that also happens to not ruin every surprise, hit me with a link. Or just post…

I'm with you there. I'd be disappointed if someone who was actually lauded for their lyrics used ghostwriters, but otherwise *shrug*. Dre sounds good on record and does justice to the verses he's handed. Maybe he does a hundred takes, but what's the harm? He's really not on that level of hip-hop where concerns like…

My man. I was gonna go with Mad Skillz, for obvious reasons.

Man, I played a couple of levels of RetroBlazer recently and realized we really need to get some good level designers to work on shooters with dodgeable projectiles again.

Recently? Bulletstorm! Come for the scoring system, stay despite everything else. For example, I normally dislike regenerating health, but they totally made it work by balancing it with the need to keep your combos up. So simple, so clever.

3D Land has definitely grown on me. AJA is correct about it being a bit confused, but damn it's an amazing title to come back to every couple of months to beat any StreetPass pretender's best times. I normally don't care about leaderboards because, duh, of course someone on the internet is better than I am, but give…

I know that (in X-2) upgrading one weapon weakens the others, but I didn't know there was chaining involved. At all. Yeesh.

Nope, not at all. It's on the list, but I'll give it a bump. Confession: When I cleared Thunder Force V this year, it was on the insultingly labeled "Kids" difficulty setting, and I don't even feel bad about it. I know my limits, man. *takes another swig*

Just the preference. I may be wrong, but it seems like consensus is that Gradius is godly while R-Type is just very good and the first boss looks cool and the spaceship stage is neat. Personally I think not only does R-type's art design and music stand head and shoulders above Gradius, but also the Force allows for…

Yeah, definitely that new Zelda. I just powered through the remainder of Fire Emblem: Awakening so I'd be done in time. Probably some Gradius II (PC-Engine) as well, which is great and everything but my love still belongs to R-Type. Questionable taste, maybe, but it is what it is.

Dunno about the 4, but as far as I know the PS3 works with every HID standard compliant device. To my knowledge the X360 pad isn't one of those, but if you have something from Logitech or Thrustmaster lying around it should work. That includes keyboards and mice too, if you find a use for them.

I think maybe it's just not meant that way. I imagine the people who produced NES cartridges in 2010 are first and foremost people who are into producing NES cartridges. Personally I don't even own a soldering iron, but I get finding circuit boards more exciting than zip files. I'm fine with not being able to play…

It's not a game and yeah I've babbled about it before, but here we go again: Titan's Overdrive is my favorite demo of the year and runs on a Mega Drive. What they do with the world map circa 2:50 wowed me way more than any Cryengine/Frostbite stuff. And that's not even the most impressive stuff I've seen, a title that…

Actually, it's been done (for "mixtapes" at least). A$AP Mob and Action Bronson & Alchemist spring to mind.

The thing is, the album wasn't THAT bad. If you could cut Shaq out of every song, it'd feel like an okay collection of Mic Geronimo b-sides or something. That's more than you could say about a lot of other ill-advised celebrity albums.

Awesome! Yeah, the grain on the HK disc definitely looks DVD-ish and there's some edge enhancement going on too, while the German one seems to have lost some detail due to color correction. Weird, I remember how they said they'd have a meticulously restored Blu-Ray ready in time for the remake. So… guess I'll hold on…

Off-topic but you seem to know your stuff, so what the hell: I've heard that the 2011 HK Blu-Ray remaster of A Chinese Ghost Story is supposedly pretty good. Trouble is, I've got a Region B player, and last time I checked the Region B Blu-Rays (from 2009 or so) were reportedly just upscales from already mediocre…

There you are! So, uhm, that new Oddisee instrumental thing is pretty cool. And that's all I got.